Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
John 12:12-19, Palm branches and a donkey's colt
The festival crowd goes out with palm branches, shouting Hosanna and hailing Jesus as King of Israel, and he rides in on a young donkey, as Zechariah had said Zion's king would come.
John 12:12-19, in every translation this tool compares.
Festival crowds hear that Jesus is coming and go out with palm branches, hailing him as Israel's king with the shouts of a Passover psalm. Jesus rides in on a young donkey, which John links to Zechariah's picture of a king who comes in peace, though the disciples saw the link only later. Word of the raising of Lazarus keeps the crowds coming, and the Pharisees despair that everyone is following him.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/hailing-a-king\/","n":"Hailing a king","s":"A colt nobody had ridden, cloaks on the road, waving branches, kneeling, the cry Hail, and the delegation that went out to meet a visiting ruler: the public gestures that greeted a king.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/feast-of-dedication\/","n":"The Festival of Dedication","s":"The eight-day winter feast of lights that remembered how Judas Maccabeus cleansed and rededicated the temple after Antiochus IV defiled it. It recalled liberation, and it called kings to mind.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/messiah\/","n":"The Messiah, son of David","s":"The anointed king most Jews expected from David's line, who would free Israel from its enemies. Nobody expected him to be killed.","r":""}
People already in Jerusalem usually went out to welcome arriving pilgrims (Keener). Palm branches had to be brought up from Jericho, were used at Tabernacles, and had been a national symbol since the Maccabees, waved to celebrate victories (Keener and his notes, citing 1 Maccabees 13:51 and 2 Maccabees 10:7). Wright hears the Festival of Dedication at Passover: when Judas Maccabaeus cleansed the temple, "his followers entered the city waving palm branches in celebration," and in Jesus and the Victory of God he calls the Maccabean echoes in the entry deliberate. Hosanna means save, and the shout comes from Psalm 118:25-26, part of the Hallel sung through the Passover season, so the words were fresh in everyone's mind (Keener and his notes). Military heroes rode horses or were drawn in chariots; a donkey, following Zechariah 9:9, marks a king who is not coming as a warrior-conqueror (Keener and his notes). The ESV Study Bible thinks most of the crowd took King of Israel in a political and military sense.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on John 12:12-13 and 12:14-16
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on John 12:13 and 12:15
- N. T. Wright, John for Everyone, Part Two, comment on John 12:9-19
- N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God, ch. 11, Jesus and Israel: The Meaning of Messiahship, endnote 40
- ESV Study Bible, study notes on John 12:12-19 and 12:13
